[uniqueuid]

Before this blows up:

- The world has very diverse ideas about how media regulation works. Germany has a strong public service broadcast tradition that is constitutionally anchored. You may not like it, but that's the cultural and legal tradition and changing it is not easily done. Please respect that especially coming from a country with a more liberal tradition (and perhaps a less functional media system, e.g. in the US).

- The source is a fringe right-wing outlet that most Germans would consider a bit suspicious (not necessarily factually wrong, but tasteless and a bit hysteric perhaps?)

- Public service broadcasting in Germany is not influenced by the state (note this says state, not politics or politicians) by design.

- Prioritizing public service broadcasters is a pretty logical conclusion from a certain tradition of media regulation and has precedent, e.g. in must carry rules for cable, EPGs etc.

So sure, debatable whether this is sensible, but it's at least neither surprising nor evidently nonsensical.

Source: Was a tiny bit of an expert on this for a short while.

[slopinthebag]

How is it guaranteed that public service broadcasting in Germany is not influenced by government?

To me this seems like a gross intervention in the media so I'm struggling not to be critical here. Just because different cultures have different values does not make them equal.

[fuoqi]

Because it is a "public broadcast", so it obviously "Cannot Give In To Government Pressure": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog

[uniqueuid]

I mean, that's a very intuitive question if you're not used to the system, and a bit surprising if you are.

The historic precedent is that Germany's first Chancellor wanted to establish a state-funded and state-directed TV station. This was explicitly shut down by the constitutional court.

As a result, a system was established to (1) ensure funding is not decided upon by state institutions but instead by an independent body of experts (KEF). (2) control over the meta-level content decisions is exercised by a body (essentially like a parliament) of representatives from societal groups (e.g. including politicians, doctors, churches etc etc.)

Now the "gross intervention in the media" is a very recent American idea - up until pretty recently the US did have the fairness doctrine, it has licensing and so on, all of these are gross interventions in media. And so are libel laws etc. So the German insight that underpins its media regulation is: You cannot have functional mass media without enabling them through some form of state action, you can only try to be light-handed and implement checks and balances.

[slopinthebag]

I understand it's difficult for an outsider to understand the system, especially since I don't know who is part of the KEF or how it's run, same with the body of representatives. And I also acknowledge that having foreign tech companies curate media isn't much better.

In my country the federal government heavily subsidises media in addition to their own state-run broadcaster, and there is noticeable bias which is a point of contention. Perhaps the German system is superior in this regard. But I am heavily skeptical of interventions like this.

[bulbar]

It was installed by the US after WWII, because the Nazis took over the media and this public broadcasting system was installed to prevent that in the future. It's technically not paid by tax money and the government can not shut them down or stop their funding.

I believe watching some "tagesschau", the primary format of the public media in Germany would be something of interest for every US citizen. Just to experience the style.

It's part of German culture, all movies on all channels start at 8:15, because that's when tagesschau ends. The structure, the style, how news are reported has not really changed since the 80s, maybe it has basically never changed.

They do framing, I don't think you can report news without framing them, but it never gets wild and they try to show what different sides have to say about a matter.

Others have already pointed out that the source of this article is not reliable, so we should wait what actually gets proposed.

[raffael_de]

It is influenced by the government indirectly through complaisance. The heads of the stations are always aligned with CDU, SPD and the positions are passed on accordingly.

[_ink_]

To back up your third point, here is a study of the political bias in the German public service broadcasters (in German):

https://web.archive.org/web/20240207032743/https://polkom.if...

[uniqueuid]

Thanks, that's a great point. I know a huge amount of the literature exactly in this area, and I'm honestly still pretty skeptical of the theoretical idea of the diversity principle. Mostly because there doesn't seem to be a good consensus what actually is a good amount of diversity.

But in practical terms, while there are some very obvious gaps and biases, I think the German media system is still pretty good in a lot of ways and everybody does have a lot of freedom.

I'd even go so far as to say - the typical accusations of censorship are mostly from right-wing actors who are not censored, but who demand more views and make a spectacle out of claiming to be censored.

[slopinthebag]

Can you summarise this?

[raxxorraxor]

Public service broadcasting is influenced by the state in Germany. Not directly, but there are clear common boundaries and influences. The Rundfunkräte (broadcasting boards) have the job to ensure impartiality, but are often occupied by party officials.

As for tradition, I do think the model should be reviewed...